TIME Magazine: America May Be Ready for Libertarianism

So says no less than TIME magazine, in an excellent article on the libertarian movement in their July 21 issue.

The remarkably positive article is yet more proof that libertarian ideas are catching on and spreading fast.

The article describes how libertarians have grabbed the public's attention this year:

"First there was the Ron Paul revolution, in which an avuncular 10-term Representative from Brazoria County, Texas, raised more than $34 million as a pseudo-Republican candidate, garnered more than a million primary votes and outperformed Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson, all on the back of a get-government-off-my-back platform.

"Now there's the Libertarian Party, which sold a little bit of its hard-line liberty-loving soul in exchange for the most respectable candidate it has ever had: recently converted former Republican Congressman Bob Barr, who's polling nationally near 6% and could conceivably Naderize John McCain in a few key states and help nudge the presidency to Barack Obama."

Barr's remarkable conversion from GOP conservative drug warrior to civil liberties champion and pro-freedom libertarian is highlighted. TIME also notes that LP candidates are increasingly influential: "Since 2000, Libertarian candidates have peeled off enough votes from Republican congressional candidates to cost the party races in Washington, Nevada, Montana and, most recently, Louisiana."

Further, notes TIME:

"The central goal of Libertarianism is hard to disagree with: freedom. Defining it is another matter. Party members I've met often speak of freedom as if it were a phantom limb: you're born with it, but it gets taken from you by the bureaucratic violence of the EPA, the ATF, the DOE, the DEA, the U.N., NCLB, NAFTA and -- above all -- the IRS. Freedom's restoration is the magic moment when the nanny state melts away and you can see the life you were supposed to live before the tax auditors and environmental regulators and drug warriors all came to rope, brand and pen you in for life with their endless rulemaking and intrusions."

Not bad!

Of course, there are things to disagree with. TIME caricatures some libertarian positions in ways that will have any libertarian groaning.

Like this: "This sense that progress has gone too far and too fast unites a large swath of Libertarians from coast to coast." Huh? Since when did libertarians become anti-progress?

But never mind such errors. The article is remarkably positive. And it's the second this year that TIME has printed a major article favorable to libertarians. As we reported several months back, the October 18, 2007 issue of TIME featured an opinion piece by Michael Kinsley, one of America's most respected and astute political commentators -- entitled "Libertarians Rising."

The current article ends this way, and though it refers to the Libertarian Party, it's also talking about libertarian ideas in general:

"[V]oters alienated by our calcified party system may find in the Libertarians a party that's .... armed to the teeth but with a gentle logic and a contagious enthusiasm for freedom in all its forms. Libertarians are getting ready for the mainstream, and mainstream America may finally be ready for them."

"Every great new thought was opposed. Every great new invention was denounced. The first motor was considered foolish. The airplane was considered impossible. The power loom was considered vicious. Anesthesia was considered sinful. But the men of unborrowed vision went ahead. They fought, they suffered and they paid. But they won."

RonPaulForums.com / LibertyForest.com is a grassroots web site with absolutely no official connection to Ron Paul or any election campaign. RonPaulForums.com / LibertyForest.com is privately owned and operated.